About things bamboo, mostly

Tag Archives: low-cost housing

This deserves to come first. A wonderfully simple and effective idea: Bamboo shinguards for soccer players. Time is running out for your opportunity to invest in the project on Kickstarter (18 August).

Inspired by tepees? This triangular modular hotel made with bamboo is getting lots of attention. The design is a flexible system allowing the bamboo structure to be expanded horizontally and vertically, they say. It’s hard to imagine you wouldn’t feel every movement within the building.

Another take on expand-as-needed architecture is inspired by bamboo scaffolding.

Just add more floors as required, using waste from other offices. “Each floor is made from an interlaced network of tube framing, with construction building materials being sourced from waste material produced by the offices, namely paper and plastics.”

One for the painters: here is a review of a bamboo brush box. It gets a 4.8 (out of 5) star rating on Amazon.

A new hospital in India is clad with bamboo. The bamboo “acts as a natural insulator and allows the hospital to do away with air conditioning in common areas such as lobbies and reception. This resulted in saving electricity and reducing maintenance cost.” It looks good too.

Here is a short video clip about the construction of a traditional Hong Kong bamboo installation. The ‘flower plaque’ is part of the Smithsonian Institutes 2014 Folklife Festival. Learn more about flower plaques here and here.

Precision computerised joinery and high-tech adhesives are all that hold these bamboo chairs together. There’s also some nesting tables of a similar construction.

In case you missed the YouTube vids of the awesome rocket festival in Northern Thailand here is a link. Not for the faint hearted.

Colossal has published photos of Wang Wen-Chih’s finished bamboo entry tunnel (mentioned here back in October) at the Woodford Folk Festival site.

Bamboo urinal: a self-contained and somewhat mobile, eco-friendly public urinal. The unit has three main components; planter module (with the growing bamboo); the water tank; and, the urinal and sink. One pees in the urinal (women can use a disposable funnel to achieve this). Once done, a foot pump draws water from the water tank for hand washing and urinal rinsing. The used water is pumped into the planter module/biofilter, where the bamboo is growing in a medium of rocks, wood chips and styrofoam. The water, nitrogen and phosphorous are used by the bamboo, while bacteria living in the growing medium break down carbohydrates and protein. There is reportedly little if any smell. A prototype was tested in a San Francisco neighbourhood and stood up to use by over 300 people within an 8 hour period, says Gizmag.

Bamboo shelters inside abandoned factory buildings is one solution for the housing shortage in Hong Kong offered by architects from AFFECT T. These are positively spacious compared to other barely-affordable options for Hong Kong’s poor workers.

More for bamboo sticks, these ones more high-tech: Bamboo ski poles and bamboo skis. As a resident of the wet tropics, I rarely get to see snow, let alone play in it. You will find a review of new bamboo skis here. They look gorgeous. Mobile art? Some of them are available on Amazon. Alternatively, there are some very interesting looking vintage bamboo skis and ski poles on eBay au.

The Saint Joseph Parish Church in Las Piñas, The Phillipines, is now a designated National Treasure. The church is home to a famous bamboo organ, already a National Cultural Treasure. Pipe organ buffs will already be familiar with this historic instrument. People write books about it, write music for it, and record music played on it. There is a small book
and music selection on Amazon, and eBay au has a few records and CDs. If you’re too curious to hear the bamboo organ and can’t wait, here’s a YouTube clip for you:

The International Bamboo Conclave is on this weekend (22-23 Feb, 2014). Lucky you if you’re in Bangalore (India). Head out to the University of Agricultural Sciences.

The gathering provides a forum to promote bamboo for integrated development. There are technical sessions and an exhibition of products. Experts have gathered to discuss policy issues, innovative technologies, its use in buildings, furniture, handicrafts and other cottage industries, skill development in the bamboo sector, and global trends.

India is the second largest producer of bamboo in the world, next to China. India has 128 bamboo species belonging to 18 genera. They make up 12.8 per cent of the total forest area in India.

The conclave brings to light why growing bamboo makes socio-economic sense. Architect and member of the Bamboo Society of India, Neelam Manjunath says “housing for the poor should be seriously thought over, as bamboo can be the best substitute to concrete. It can replace 70 per cent of steel and wood used in construction, and bring down the costs by nearly 40 per cent.”

For all the potential benefits, India lags in utilising bamboo. Apparently it all started with the British calling it the ‘poor man’s timber.’ Current government policies are not helping either. Bamboo is classified as timber in many states and permits are needed to harvest it. The Indian Forest Act effectively provides the forest department a monopoly over bamboo and creates opportunities for corruption and harassment.

Bamboo has the potential to generate economic wealth – sustainable and equitable development. Imagine if bamboo was put in the hands of the local people? To grow, to harvest and to add value? People determining and influencing their own future? Sounds democratic to me. What do you think?

Did you like the Gucci bags with bamboo handles featured in the September version of this post? Now you can get bamboo heels to match. At A$650 a pair, much less expensive than the bag. Fashion Foie Gras described them as ” rather conservative and definitely have a party going on there from the back.”

The ever-increasing demand for PVC plastic kites is sounding a death knell for the craft of handmade kites in Hyderabad, India, according to the The Hindu.

2,500 bamboo strips dating from 305 BC, unearthed from an illegal tomb excavation in China, were donated to, and restored by, the Tsinghua University in Beijing. 21 of the strips are an elaborate multiplication matrix.

More innovative architecture from Designboom: bamboo sleeping units for an orphanage near the Thai-Burmese border. For more images and details, click on the image.

Still more from Designboom: Tranquillity in the heart of a metropolis. No, it’s not made of bamboo, rather, bamboo provides shade and shadow-play in an otherwise linear building.

More tranquillity (secular). (And more Designboom) What particular architectural elements achieve serenity for this cafe in Vietnam? Water? Bamboo? The curves?

A compilation of posts on the Internet about bamboo from Google Alerts in September:

• Inspired by the La Balsas rafts, the Shearwater Steiner School in northern NSW made a bamboo raft and took a trip. If this looks tempting, you might like to try it in Borneo. Insect repellent tops the list of things to bring for this trip.

• Like the look of bamboo but worry about it invading? Try artificial bamboo. Follow the links for pictures.